Residents shop for food at a temporary food store set up to serve residents outside a residential block after delivery services were suspended in Xi’an City, in northwest China’s Shaanxi province, on January 3.
Highlight
- Residents of the Chinese city of Xi’an face strict coronavirus lockdown
- Strict measures to contain outbreak are common in China
- The lockdown imposed in Xi’an on 23 December is one of the harshest in the country since the shutdown in 2020
Residents of the Chinese city of Xi’an face strict coronavirus lockdowns, with business owners facing further closures and some complaining of difficulties finding food, despite assurances from officials that they will be largely Limited are able to provide necessities for 13 million people. to their homes.
Strict measures to contain the outbreak are common in China, which still maintains a policy of stamping out every COVID-19 case at a time when many other countries have opted to try to live with the virus. But the lockdown imposed on December 23 in Xi’an is one of the harshest in the country since the lockdown in and around Wuhan in 2020, when the coronavirus was first detected there.
On Tuesday, officials announced that another city in Henan province, Yuzhou, was placed under lockdown over the weekend after only three asymptomatic cases were discovered.
The Chinese have largely adhered to strict measures during the pandemic, but despite the risk of retaliation from communist authorities, complaints have emerged over the tough policies. However, the Xi’an lockdown comes at a particularly sensitive time, as China prepares to hold the Beijing Winter Olympics, which begins on February 4, and is therefore under particularly intense pressure to contain the outbreak.
“Can’t leave the building, and buying food online is becoming more and more difficult,” said a resident of Xi’an. The post was from a verified account, but the person did not respond to a request for further comment.
Zhang Canyu, an expert on the State Council’s epidemic prevention and control team, acknowledged that “there may be supply pressures in communities.”
But he was also quoted by the official Xinhua news agency as saying: “The government will do everything possible to coordinate resources to provide people with daily necessities and medical services.”
The lockdown in Xi’an originally allowed people to leave the house every two days to shop for basic goods, but has since been tightened, although rules differ in each district according to the severity of the outbreak . Some people are not allowed to go out at all and have to be delivered. People can go out of the city only after taking special permission.
In recent days, people in Xi’an can be seen shopping at pop-up markets, served by workers in head-to-toe white protective suits. Community volunteers also visited people’s homes to ask what they needed.
Yet tensions have begun to show, with residents complaining on Weibo of being unable to source needs. In a widely shared video, the guard can be seen attacking a man who tried to give boiled buns to family members. According to a statement by Xi’an police posted on Weibo, the guard later apologized to the man and was fined 200 yuan ($31) each.
In an online diary on the popular Weixin site, a Xi’an-based author said that after an initial wave of panic and the closure of markets, residents soon began searching for food online.
Jiang Xue wrote, “In this age of material surplus, when everyone is trying to lose weight, finding enough to eat has suddenly become a difficult task.” A message sent to the account was not returned immediately.
China’s “zero tolerance” strategy of dropping every case, ramping up testing and trying to prevent new infections from abroad helped contain previous outbreaks. But the lockdowns are far more drastic than anything seen in the West, and have taken a toll on the economy and the lives of millions.
Measures are often applied after some cases have been identified, as was seen in Yuzhou. Since rules went into effect there on Sunday, residents have been allowed to return to the city of 1.7 million, but are not allowed to self-isolate. Only emergency vehicles are allowed on city roads. A wide range of restaurants, sports facilities and other businesses have been ordered to close, while markets can only provide basic necessities, an order from the city government said.
Meanwhile, Xi’an, home to the famous terracotta army statues with major industries, has seen more than 1,600 cases, which officials say is driven by the delta variant, which is less infectious than the new Omicron strain, of which China is the only Few cases have been reported. Another 95 infections were announced on Tuesday.
A total of 102,841 cases and 4,636 deaths have been reported in China since the pandemic began. While those numbers are relatively small compared to the US and other countries, and potentially underestimate as they are everywhere, they show the persistence of the virus despite sometimes drastic measures by China.
A third round of mass testing has been ordered for Xi’an, which has been able to swab 10 million people in just seven hours and process up to 3 million results in just 12 hours, according to state media.
While Wuhan’s health care system was overwhelmed after the pandemic began in late 2019, China has not reported a shortage of beds or medical equipment and staff in Xi’an. Two dozen special teams have been formed to deal with COVID-19 cases and some hospitals have been set aside for other types of care, Xinhua news agency reported.
According to Our World in data, China has vaccinated about 85% of its population. Shots have helped reduce the severity of the disease, although Chinese vaccines are considered less effective than elsewhere.
In a sign of pressure on officials to contain the outbreak, officials have been served notices that they will lose their jobs if they do not reduce the number of new cases. Already, the top two Communist Party officials in Yanta district, where half of the city’s cases are reported, have been fired, according to a statement from the government of surrounding Shaanxi province.
The head of a tourism firm, who reached the phone, said on Tuesday that supplies were basically adequate, but that his business was being affected since July.
“Now with the lockdown, the impact has become huge,” said the man, who gave his surname Wen, as is common among Chinese.
Qin Huilin, who works at a traditional mutton soup restaurant, said the lockdown brought business to a screeching halt.
“We used to have about a hundred customers every day, but we haven’t had a customer for more than a dozen days since the lockdown,” Qin said over the phone. “The impact on our business is significant, but I can go shopping to the supermarket once every few days and there’s ample supply.”
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